Thirteen years of perfect attendance and all I got was a stupid $20 gift certificate from stupid McDonald’s
By William M. Hartnett on Dec 6, 2007 in oddities
Kids these days. Is there no end to their wimpy need for constant coddling? From the story Straight A’s, With a Burger as a Prize in today’s NYT:
Students in kindergarten through fifth grade can now receive a Happy Meal from a local McDonald’s restaurant as a “food prize,” as it is described, for achievements like all A’s and B’s in academic subjects or two or fewer absences from school.
Seriously, all A’s and B’s? I’ll tell you what all B’s got you in my house: Nothing. Nothing is what all B’s got you in my house. Nothing also is what straight A’s got you in my house. And what’s this nonsense about a Happy Meal for “two or fewer absences from school?” Do you know how many absences I tallied in 13 years of K-12 education in the Manatee County, Florida public school system? Zero. Zero also is the number of Happy Meals those zero absences (in 13 years, lest we forget) earned me.
What I did get was a $20 gift certificate from McDonald’s after those 13 years of perfect attendance. This being 1996, I blew the whole thing on Arch Deluxes for my whole crew. Yeah, that’s right, I had a crew. I had 13 years of perfect attendance and a crew, a nerdy, straight-5′s-on-our-AP-exams scoring crew.
(That didn’t make me sound like a stupid old fool again, did it?)
